Friday, March 06, 2009

"Lippy"

Via Sylvia. Fifteen year old girl/woman of color gets taken into custody, kicks her shoe off in the general direction of the cops, and gets viciously beaten in response.

Some guy responds by trying to tell YouTubers to have some empathy and -not- automatically go to "she got what she deserved."

Unsurprisingly there are a few of those in the comments.

yep..cops abuse their power for sure.. but ya know what. go anywhere else in the world and call a cop a fat pig and see what you get..criminals got it easy in the US. we are too light on criminals in this country.. not saying the little girl deserved it..she didn't. but if it was a 18 yr old boy..then it would be a-ok with me.

...Police Officer do 1000 good things and none gets mentioned. Only negative events get attention as if that's all they do.

Would you like MS 13 or Aryan Nation to conduct law enforcement in your street instead of local Police?

People who cry about Police, Military have dirt on them and that's why their hate any law or authority.

People like you twist the truth to fit their fantasy world.

I was going to say something snarky about the fail of people in general and youtube commenters in particular, but actually most of the comments on that one are thankfully not along the lines of the above.

Of course you go elsewhere, like "Right Pundits," and get commentary like this:

http://www.rightpundits.com/?p=2970

This video is currently all over the internet and national news. Frankly, I believe the media spends too much time worrying about police brutality, a minor, insignificant issue in American society. For every cop that beats up a little girl, for every cop that accidentally shoots a criminal, there are about 10,000 criminals brutalizing and humiliating law-abiding people on our streets every day. While nothing justifies violence, police brutality is not a major problem in American society. A much bigger, much more dehumanizing, much more embarrassing problem for America is CRIME.

Every time the media reports on police brutality, I feel that as a responsible citizen I need to remind people that the bigger problem in American society is crime, not the police who defend us against it and rarely overstep their bounds. Instead of focusing on a cop who lost his cool, perhaps we should also focus on the fact that this 15-year-old girl is hurling insults at grown men in authority and getting herself arrested. Police officers don’t just randomly beat and shoot people. They are put in extremely tense situations by criminals and forced to make life or death decisions on a moment’s notice. Sometimes they make mistakes. Most of the time, they do not. It’s the criminals that create and force these situations. They are the real problem, not the police.

Perhaps this girl did not deserve what she got in the video. I’m sure a million-dollar civil lawsuit will determine that. Unfortunately, she will be rewarded for her bad behavior, while a police officer will likely lose his job for one mistake.

Schene had previously been in the news in 2006 after he fatally shot Pedro Jo, a mentally ill man, during a struggle after a traffic stop on Interstate 5. It was the second officer-involved shooting of his career.

An inquest jury ruled the shooting was justified. Jo viciously attacked Schene, trying to strangle him with his own radio cord.

Jo then ran back to his car and disobeyed Schene's orders to stop. Schene said he saw Jo reach for something in the seat, so Schene fired 11 times after Jo ran back to his car.

The University of Washington student shot to death in his car by a King County sheriff's deputy was a convicted felon, but friends remembered him Wednesday as a would-be teacher dedicated to social work.

Pedro Jo, 33, was shot multiple times Tuesday morning after a violent scuffle with the deputy, who pulled him over on Interstate 5 in South Seattle for driving erratically.

While all the facts of the shooting -- and the deputy's name -- have not been released, the Seattle P-I has identified the deputy as Paul Schene, who works out of SeaTac. A five-year veteran of the force, Schene, 28, is currently on paid administrative leave -- a standard procedure in officer-involved shootings.

It isn't the deputy's first shooting-related leave. It happened in 2002, after Schene shot and wounded a 23-year-old car-thief suspect who had led deputies on a wild chase in Burien, according to court records.

After three women fled the car, deputies approached on foot. The driver rammed one of them in the legs with his vehicle and sped away, records show.

During the pursuit, Schene used his patrol vehicle to bump the thief's car, causing it to jump a curb. The driver, who had a long criminal record, got out and began heading toward Schene, ignoring the deputy's order to stop, according to police. Schene then fired three shots, hitting the man in the chest, arm and leg...

Interesting. My Asian partner of 8 years had no problem whatsoever with the Ninja reference. Funny that. He actually picked out the pic that went with the post. I didn't offend myself either when I said "Lou Dobbs could eat my taco" and found a pic of him wearing a sombrero and holding a chihuahua.

No worries though. As far as being "ass-deep in the canal and floating out to sea" goes, you are quite wrong about that. I just don't have as much free time to blog as I'd like. I do other things as well. I'll be adding other posts that people have sent in as time permits.

Sorry if that post bothered you and your friend. There are other people who don't share your view. Regardless, that doesn't change my admiration for the content on your blog.

you know, i'm too lazy to look up that particular bingo card right now ("my partner/best friend/etc wasn't offended, ergo it wasn't/shouldn't be offensive, including in this case to the actual trans woman of color to whom the purported admiration was directed), so I'll just say: good luck with that then, there, d00d. srsly.